Riverland Storm Damage

Mr WHETSTONE (Chaffey) (15:50): I would like to speak about the devastation that the Riverland and surrounding areas suffered during Friday's freak storm in the Riverland and some parts of the Mallee. On Friday, I got home and checked the weather map. I heard the storm was coming and saw unusual sights on the radar screen. We had black lines coming on the screen. When we see red that means heavy rainfall, but to see black is really the danger sign.

During that storm, it was a very eerie, scary time. I was perched at my home in a back room with a big glass area and watched the storm roll in, and there was nothing that anyone could have done. It uprooted trees that had been there for 50 years. It smashed Mallee 10 feet up off the ground. It tore a path of destruction. In Adelaide, a lot of the photos we saw were of round hail: in the Riverland, it was jagged. It was absolutely disastrous. Anything it touched, it cut and destroyed.

I was out and about over the weekend, and I visited and toured around the region with Senator Anne Ruston to look at the destruction and visit growers and producers who were severely impacted by those gale-force winds and hailstones. I have seen big hailstones as a lad, but not of the severity of these stones, with jagged sharp edges and the destruction they caused. It was as bad a weather event as I have ever seen, and living in the Riverland for over 30 years, it was something that was quite a scary scene.

Speaking to the older generation, those who have been in the region for 60 or 70 years, they said that they had never seen anything like its ferocity. The hailstones did not come down and pelt things: they came in horizontally and took out everything in their path. My neighbour, who has a citrus property, copped it twice. The storm came in once, went around and then came back again and it got both sides of his trees.

It was not until we got out into the region and had a look around that we saw the total destruction. We visited a number of growers who gathered at Lyrup. We went down to a stone fruit property and saw that there was 100 per cent damage and, sadly for that grower, John Recchia, it was a crop that had been designed, marketed, pre-sold and contracts pre-signed as a fruit fly free product going into China.

It was absolutely heartbreaking to see the vineyards and the destruction of the citrus and the almonds. The almonds were lying on the ground, and many people might know that almonds are a premium-priced product at the moment. We could see the damage that had been caused, not only knocking the fruit onto the ground but damaging the fruiting or bud wood for next year's crop and for a number of years.

In some instances, we saw trees that will have to be removed because they were so badly damaged, and there were trees that were removed because they had been blown out of the ground. It really was a very, very alarming scene. On the Sunday, I met with the federal Assistant Minister for Agriculture and Water Resources, Senator Anne Ruston, and state Liberal leader, Steven Marshall, and the Minister for Agriculture, minister Bignell, who came to see what is estimated to be about $100 million in damage, and those reports are going to be reasonably accurate.

The tens of thousands of tonnes of product that were lost will impact on export markets and forward contracts. It is also about the households and the businesses that were left without power for 24 hours. I received a phone call from a business in the Mallee that had its power put back on after 60 hours. We do need to see bipartisan support, and we do need to see disaster relief and recovery assistance for those primary producers. For that 24-hour recovery hotline, phone 8207 7847, or 0476 834 530.

I also want to mention the mental strain that is put onto those growers, those farmers. For mental health issues, please contact Lifeline on 13 11 14, or contact beyondblue. These ongoing issues will be with us for a little while yet, so the message to the community is: talk to your neighbours, talk to the growers and give them some comfort.